Christmas Musings
by StandingOnTheRooftops
Summary: Marie's thinking about something during the christmas holiday.  She asks herself a question... and might find the answer.  SteinxSpirit, written for SilentEpiphany, because she's the bestest! Very short drabble.  More like half-shot than one shot!


Title: Christmas Musings

Author: StandingOnTheRooftops

Anime: Soul Eater

Summary/Warnings: Drabble, Marie's pov, yaoi/shonen-ai hints, anime-verse, post series.

Dedication: Written as a Christmas present for SilentEpiphany. SteinxSpirit isn't my favoritest pairing out there, but it's what she wanted, so I'm more than happy to give it to her! Enjoy!

Christmas Musings

Christmas carols drifted lightly through the lab, making for quite an odd contrast. Light and cheery songs, twinkling little lights on the ever-green tree. Bright red and green bows here and there, everywhere. In what had once been a stark, sparse medical lab.

Marie's touch could be seen all over, giving the space a homey and cheerful air.

Well, at least that's what she thought. She was pretty sure that Stein didn't much like all her things in his way.

But the man needed a little 'domesticating', she thought. She already knew she had no chance with him... and to be honest, he'd become somewhat of a brother-figure to her. And marrying your brother was just downright odd.

But still, he needed domesticating. He needed a woman to settle him down a bit. Hell, he needed to **settle** down with a woman. But the only person he ever seemed to even enjoy time with- besides herself- was Spirit Albarn. And that man was anything but a good influence. Really. She hadn't been that surprised to learn that his sleeping around had ended with him divorcing Kami. Nope, not at all.

Although...

Marie frowned, looking into the flame of one of her pretty little votive candles. She hadn't been seeing Spirit running around much lately. She'd seen him turn his head a few times, and she'd heard him say some things... but remarkably, she hadn't seen much actual chasing. Which was odd for him.

It had been understandable during the crisis with Medusa and Asura, but the two had both been gone for months now. Why hadn't she noticed this trend before? Of course, she thought, she'd been preoccupied with all the other changes she'd witnessed since Asura's defeat at the hands of Spirit's daughter Maka. Maka had turned her demon scythe, Soul, into the newest Death Scythe. Death the Kid had taken to being much more involved in his father's work. Black*Star, with the help of the samurai Mifune and his weapon Tsubaki's family, had calmed down and leveled out- without much of a dent in his arrogant and trademarked personality.

And of course, she'd been dealing with Chrona. With the death of the demon-swordsman's biological mother, she'd been granted the trial- and abundant joy- of raising the child. She'd been surprised to find herself slowly letting go of her obsession with getting married. She didn't need to marry herself off to have a family. Which was one of the reasons she was still here, in Death City, at Stein's Lab, raising the contrasting duo of Chrona and Ragnanrok.

So... perhaps it was understandable she hadn't noticed this marked change in Spirit's behavior. But, she thought, know that she noticed... what would she do with her knowledge? And, for that matter, what had brought about this change.

The more she stared off into space, thinking about it and thinking about him, the more she came to see two reasons, both very likely- thought one more than the other. She was inclined to believe it was both.

Perhaps it was his relationship with Maka. Maka detested her father's loose behavior, so perhaps rectifying that was his way of trying to fall back into his daughter's good graces.

And perhaps, just perhaps, it was Stein's fault. Perhaps she had it backwards, and Spirit wasn't going to be a bad influence on Stein, but that Stein would be a positive influence on Spirit.

She almost laughed aloud at the second one. Stein being a positive influence on anyone was almost absurd. And yet she couldn't get the idea out of her head.

Maybe she should as Asuza. Asuza always seemed to know everything. Nodding her head to the candle- who didn't nod back- she turned to exit her room and leave to find Asuza. It was late, but that didn't matter when problems of the heart were at stake.

She opened her room, and walked quietly down the hall, almost halfway through what she'd converted into the 'living room', before she stopped, and backed up, still as quiet as possible.

She didn't want to disturb them after all. She smiled to herself as she spared them one last look and then scurried silently back to her room, leaving the silvery-haired meister and the fiery-haired weapon cuddled up close on the couch, snoozing in the Christmas evening.

Asuza could wait. Besides... she figured she pretty much had her answer anyway.

Owari


End file.
